In a non-weird way, living in apartments is the major way that gameplay has changed. Well, as the EP is called "Apartment Life", I suppose that comes as no surprise. Naturally, some parts of apartment living are different to living on an owned lot but it is to be expected that some parts are the same.

The first thing that is the same is that you still are going to have to pay the bills on your own possessions. You can't stop them, nor can you expect the landlord to pay them for you. They are not covered by the weekly rent and your kindly landlord is not going to pay them for you. The bills are still your responsibility.

You can decorate your apartment as you would have done a house. You can change the wall and floor coverings and add what decorations and furniture you feel like. This apartment bedroom has been redecorated using the Country Bedroom collection from the "Seasons" EP for Billie ("Grandma") Cartman now that her grandchildren have gone to college and she has the room to herself.

Seeing to your needs is also something that hasn't changed. If you've got the relevant items, you can still improve your skills, you can still go places, invite people over and have a normal social life as you did before.

The first thing that is different is that you don't own the property. In one way, this is good as you don't have to spend almost all of your start up money to buy a small property. However, you do have to pay weekly rent to the landlord and as mentioned earlier, you still have to pay your bills. You also pay in advance. Once you decide that there is a lot you want to live in and have signed the lease, the landlord takes the first week in payment. No, this is not a security deposit and no, you do not get it returned if you choose to leave.

If you do decide to move out, you do not get any rent refunded. I suggest that you do it on a Sunday before the landlord charges you for another week. You may as well get your money's worth.

Another plus is that if there are repairs that need doing to fixtures and fittings that come with the lot, the landlord can be called up and asked to come over and fix it. If the shower is broken, he'll be there. Not too sure yet about a clogged toilet whether he will come and fix that. Also, I am very sure that he won't come and clean up after you. He does patrol the building every day checking for things that need doing, which includes repairs, watering flowers, raking up leaves and so forth.

Although you can decorate and furnish the lot, you can't get into major renovations. If you don't like the style of the doors or windows and want to change them, then that's just too bad. If you want to expand the bedroom and remove one of the walls, then you're out of luck. Also, if you want to put a telescope in the communal garden, your generosity will not be accepted ... although that one is unfortunate. Architecturally, the design of the apartment cannot be changed, nor can anything be added to the communal areas. This is similar to how things are with hotels and dormitories. They cannot be changed ... not normally anyway. There are cheats to enable this, but those will be detailed in a later part.

I suppose it is only fair. If I was the landlord of an apartment building, I don't think I'd like to visit it and find that one of my tenants had made his apartment completely "open plan" by ripping some of the walls down. However, I don't think I'd be thrilled being woken up at 4 o'clock in the morning to be called out to come and fix a broken shower.

However, there are some things I find to be a bit unfair. I am disappointed with the way that cars have been dealt with. "Apartment Life" comes with the driveways pieces that were originally seen in "Nightlife" and a new garage door. However, there are design restrictions on how your sims can place their cars. They can only be parked in garages that are a physical part of the apartment.

To illustrate this, let us go back to see the Cartmans, who live at the Seaspray Apartments. This is only one of the two pre-created apartment buildings that has parking garages for some of its tenants. The Cartmans bought a car shortly after they moved in and it is parked in their garage, which adjoins their entrance hall. However, despite there being a driveway outside leading from the road to the garage, they cannot park the car on that part of the driveway. Because it is outside the apartment door, it is technically classed as part of the communal area.

However, I have just discovered a bit of a way to get around it.

This is the Parkview Condominiums where Clark Quentin, infamous TV Motoring Journalist, currently lives. While the lot was still unoccupied, it was edited and these two cars were added to the driveways outside the apartments. Clark was able to claim them both, despite them being outside different apartments. He has two cars and has not had to buy any of them. However, he is not able to sell either of them as technically, they are now communal property. If I chose to move another family in, I'm sure that they could use either car.

I've tried using whatever cheats that I can find and I regret to stay that this is the only way at this time to park cars outside on apartment lots.

Despite there being a bit of a workaround, I would have liked to see "reserved parking" where a car belonging to the occupants of an apartment could be placed, thereby leaving it out at the front of the lot. Sadly not. What is not behind the apartment door is classed as communal space and cannot be added to once a lot has been occupied. Now that sims can walk to work or school, did the developers consider that having cars to be an expensive luxury and only available for those who want to build their apartments in this way? I like my sims having cars and I mainly enjoy some of my sims living in apartments. I am just disappointed with the way that things have been done.